Jay Leno's uncomfortable return to the 'Tonight Show'

March 02, 2010|By Steve Johnson | Tribune reporter

"Get Back" is the Beatles song NBC used to underscore promos for Jay Leno's return to the "Tonight Show" chair, pushing the idea that 10:35 CST is where the thick-faced East Coaster belonged all along.

But Monday night's uncomfortable retaking of late night's most celebrated throne, suggested different Beatles tunes: "Fixing a Hole," "I Should Have Known Better," and, in the host's unambitious, comfort-food hour, "Let It Be."

Leno did not look guilty, sheepish or unconfident. In his way, he knows how to do this. But there is a taint on him now, a perception that he let Conan O'Brien take a test drive and then, rather quickly, snatched the keys back.

Despite having acknowledged to Oprah during his hiatus that he needed to do some image-rehabilitation work after NBC bungled his second succession to the "Tonight" chair, Leno didn't change much from what he had done before.

There was a slick, "SNL"-style opening and a much more tasteful set than his old "Tonight Show" had. But after that this new effort had neither pop, nor sizzle, nor surprise, and no amount of cheerleading from unconvincingly hyper first guest Jamie Foxx could make it seem otherwise.

Leno still came out and high-fived the crowd, in the apparent belief that every show should start by making viewers cringe. "It's good to be home," he then told the crowd. "I'm Jay Leno, your host. At least for a while."

Bandleader Kevin Eubanks, after threatening to leave during the show's hiatus, was, after all, back, a virtual chuckle metronome, reinforcing the feeling of staleness.

Foxx's guest shot demonstrated anew that Leno is the least accomplished of the late-night interviewers. The actor pranced about, shook champagne at an audience that didn't deserve the soaking, and basically was one couch-jump away from Tom Cruise status. Leno couldn't rein him in.

And the host had to ask skier Lindsey Vonn, the first in a parade of first-week Olympians, not only about her shin injury again (on the off chance you missed the Olympics), but about her life "in the bedroom" with her husband. That was in case the high five or the Foxx theatrics didn't make you cringe.

When the host left the studio, going to area homes in search of a hosting desk (because his prime-time show lacked one), this respectable comedy idea dragged like the end of an "SNL" sketch. Remember the Microsoft ads with Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld invading people's homes? It was like that.

On the bright side, close to the first half of the show was monologue, and that's still what Leno does best and, in all likelihood, why middle America ended up preferring him to the more clouded David Letterman on CBS for most of their head-to-head competition.

He delivers modest, well-constructed jokes aimed at safe targets: George Bush, Tiger Woods, new Chocolate Cheerios. There's none of the experimentalism or intellectualism O'Brien so winningly displayed during his brief "Tonight" tenure. There isn't the seeming struggle to keep some inner crank in check that Letterman suggests.

It's safe, right down to the mild shot Leno took at his own network, a change from the tinge of bitterness that even ever-smiling, ever-corporate Leno let through during his final appearances on his soon-to-be canceled prime-time show.

"When it comes to going downhill, nobody is faster," he said Monday in mentioning that Vonn would be a guest. "OK, except NBC."

Unfortunately, there was little in the first outing of the back-to-the-future "Tonight" to suggest that NBC will be changing course anytime soon.